Our 2021 Season Garden Highlights

Well what a season it was, there were more of you than ever before which was fantastic AND we were shortlisted for Historic House’s Garden of the Year Award. Sadly we didn’t win this time, despite all your enthusiasm and voting. Special mention here must go to June, one of our Ticket Office Volunteers, who basically wouldn’t let you in to the Gardens until you had used the QR code to vote. She really did try and we are so grateful for all of the support. To be shortlisted was a great honour and we enjoyed every second of it. We can re-apply in ten years so we are planning our grand comeback for 2031.

Sometimes, by the time we reach October, and peak pumpkin, it is hard to remember what happened during the rest of the season. So here I will hand you over to Ed Rogers for a brilliant run down of our 2021:

“Whilst the 2021 season started with an emergence from the second lockdown, and weather was not the best, visitors were undaunted. Overall it was fantastic to return to a more ‘normal’ Riverhill year.

Whilst the cold weather in the spring shortened the flowering period for the rhododendrons, the bluebells were the deepest ‘blue’ I remember and peaked on cue for the festival.

As the warmer and, at times wetter, weather arrived in the late spring, the potager became a highlight of the walled garden as the mixture of vegetables and flowers became a feature in their own right. At the same time the other herbaceous borders spread around the garden provided extensive colour throughout the summer.

The rose walk looked better than I can ever remember, the mulching, replanting and care of the roses resulted in a magnificent display which is still flowering in November.

We enjoyed being able to host two theatre productions, as well as running the summer activities. It was brilliant to end the season on a high with a very successful pumpkin festival.”

My personal highlight for this year was actually being able to see Weddings take place in the Gardens again. The past year caused so much anxiety for our couples, with ever changing guidelines and difficult choices to be made.

This season we celebrated with seven couples, four of whom had been trying to get married since 2020, often with several abandoned dates along the way, so it was extra special to finally get them married. I feel like this gorgeously triumphant photo of Louise and Mark says it all.

Thank you to you all for sticking with us and for choosing Riverhill for such an important day, we hope you will always return to the Gardens.

Angela, the Pumpkin Queen, chose our final event of the Season as her highlight, and it really was a perfect finale to 2021. Being able to do carving together again made it extra special.

“My most memorable part of this season has to be the Pumpkin Festival, even though it's at the end of the season, I love all the Autumn leaves falling around our display of bright orange pumpkins. We were so lucky to have sunny days during the festival, and watching all the kids dressed up was something very special.”

This season also saw us welcome a new Gardener to the team. The wonderful Charlie Bloom arrived at Riverhill early in the season and immediately set about transforming the upper level of our Walled Garden, creating the most incredible potager, full of scent, colour and produce. It added an entirely fresh perspective to our already impressive Walled Garden and I am sure she has new and exciting things planned for 2022.

Another extra special treat this season was our outdoor theatre events. After not being able to have these last year it felt like a total celebration and the theatre companies definitely felt it too, because their energy was off the chart!

Slapstick Picnic (the sister company of our beloved Handlebards) treated us to a riotous production of the Importance of Being Earnest whilst Kent base theatre company Changeling, brought us a very high octane Midsummer Night’s Dream, incorporating the water feature perfectly!

If you haven’t been to one of these yet I would highly recommend them for next summer. We hope to have Changeling and both Slapstick Picnic and the Handlebards back again, plus, maybe something new, fingers crossed.

These are only a selection of our favourite moments, often the best moments are the small ones; the little chats we have with our visitors, the excited faces of the children post yeti spotting, a particularly fluffy dog. We are here for it all and we know we wouldn’t be able to do any of our winter projects, continuing to restore and improve the gardens, without your support, so thank you all and see you in March!